New Delhi, Sept. 28: The enormity of the real challenge before Manmohan Singh is far higher than that posed by Mamata Banerjee.

A â€œperfect stormâ€ is gathering around the economy, according to a Centre-commissioned report packed with suggestions for a series of tough measures that will affect daily life and test the governmentâ€™s resolve to wade further into unpalatable waters.

The report presented by the Vijay Kelkar panel, which was asked to suggest a road map towards fiscal consolidation, doesnâ€™t make pleasant reading: India is teetering on the edge of a fiscal precipice, staring into a deep abyss that brings back all the horrors of 1991 when the government of the day was forced to pledge the countryâ€™s gold reserves and redeem its honour as a credit-worthy borrower.

The Centre will find it difficult to accept many of the recommendations but the report portrays an alarming picture that is often overshadowed by political posturing from multiple fronts.

The report gives a more comprehensive view of what may have pushed the Prime Minister into risking the stability of his government and taking decisions that prompted Mamata to withdraw support. Painting a gloom-and-doom scenario, the report warns of a cataclysm if the authorities decide to bury their heads in the sand and wait for the storm to pass.

â€œWe cannot overemphasise the need and urgency of fiscal consolidation. Growth is faltering and inflation seems to be embedded. The external situation is flashing red lightsâ€¦if no action is taken, we are likely to be in a worse situation than in 1991,â€ the Kelkar panel said. â€œIn other words, our economy may be encountering a â€˜perfect stormâ€™,â€ the report said towards the end.

Kelkar is a career bureaucrat who was finance secretary in 1998-99, became an executive director of the IMF and was the chairman of the Finance Commission till January 2010. He has been closely involved with the process of economic reforms in the country.

The committee was asked to recommend mid-term corrections in the financial year and to chart a framework on the basis of that correction for the rest of the Thirteenth Finance Commission's term. The panel submitted its report to finance minister P. Chidambaram in the first week of September.

The panel has suggested that the Indian government should bite the bullet and slash its subsidy bill by raising diesel, LPG and kerosene prices, increasing prices at ration shops every time they ratchet up remunerative prices for farmers, nudging up urea prices, and scrapping an outmoded system of subsidising sugar. It also advised the government to build a gigantic data tracking system that will ferret out tax dodgers.

The panel recommended that kerosene price should be raised by Rs 2 per litre while that of LPG cylinders needs to be raised by Rs 50 per cylinder. It also suggested phased elimination of subsidy on diesel and LPG in the next four years and reduction in kerosene subsidy by one-third by 2014-15.

It wanted direct transfer of cash subsidies to the beneficiaries, echoing a proposal made earlier by another panel headed by Nandan Nilekani and accepted the government. ( )

The report advised the government to sell its residual stake in Bharat Aluminium and Hindustan Zinc. Recent reports suggest that the government has initiated talks with Anil Agarwal-owned Vedanta group for the stake sale.

The report warned that if mid-year corrective actions were not taken, the fiscal deficit would balloon to around 6.1 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP), far higher than the budget estimate of 5.1 per cent.

GDP is the broadest measure of economic activity in the country and represents the market value of all officially recognised final goods and services produced within a country in a given period.

The other big worry is that the current account deficit (CAD) could worsen to 4.3 per cent of GDP this year at a time when world markets and capital flows are extremely fragile. CAD arises when payments for imports of goods and services exceed earnings from exports, potentially draining a countryâ€™s foreign exchange reserves.

The twin deficits have often been flagged by global investors and rating agencies as their biggest concerns about India as a hotspot for investment.

The report projected that fiscal deficit for fiscal 2013-14 could fall to 4.6 per cent and come down to 3.9 per cent in 2014-15, if the measures to cut subsidies are undertaken.

It is hard to immediately see the parallels with 1991 because the data points are difficult to compare. Indiaâ€™s import cover of its foreign exchange reserves has slumped to just over 7 months from 11.1 months in 2009-10 â€“ and has even drawn comment from the Reserve Bank of India. However, itâ€™s a far cry from the dire situation in August 1991 when India had money to pay for only 15 days of imports.

Foreign currency assets in June 1991 had fallen to a nadir at $1.1 billion. On September 14, this year, India had foreign exchange reserves of $294 billion, which might seem like an enormous sum in contrast to the situation in 1991. But the scale of the economy has also changed dramatically in the intervening years.

â€œCross-country benchmarking suggests that India is clearly an outlier in terms of major fiscal indicators and currently has the least room for counter-cyclical fiscal policy response if conditions take a turn for the worse in global markets,â€ the report said.

â€œThe situation is all the more dangerous nowâ€¦ because we have a surge in young people looking for jobs. If the elasticity of employment to GDP growth is 0.4, then growth of about 7 per cent per annum would give us 2.8 per cent employment growth. With a labour force growth of 2.5 per cent, this would provide adequate employment opportunities. However, if growth slips to say 6 per cent or below, and employment growth slows below 2.4 per cent, unemployment would rise,â€ the panel said.

The authorities, however, werenâ€™t ready to listen to the latest reformer-turned-Cassandra.

â€œThe government is of the view that in a developing country where a significant proportion of the population is poor, a certain level of subsidies is necessary and unavoidable. Measures must be taken to protect the poor and vulnerable sections of the society,â€ said Arvind Mayaram, secretary in the finance ministryâ€™s department of economic affairs (DEA).

Mayaram said the committee's recommendation on the withdrawal of certain subsidies was not in line with the stated policy of the government.

The committee has pegged receipts from the governmentâ€™s divestment programme at Rs 10,000 crore in the current fiscal as against a budgeted target of Rs 30,000 crore.

Mayaram, however, was confident that the government would be able to raise Rs 25,000 to 30,000 crore from the divestment scheme and would remain very close to the fiscal deficit target of 5.1 per cent of the GDP in 2012-13.

The DEA secretary clarified that the government had not taken a view on the recommendations of the committee and the report had been placed in the public domain to invite comments.

Late tonight, the government set the rules for 2G spectrum auction planned in November, which is expected to yield another Rs 30,000 crore. (See Business)

And with this situation, people like Mamata still throw tantrums and withdraw support. Such people are the bane of India, they belong to India of the 1970s. People like her should be weeded out. I am very happy that the sensible people like MMS and Chidu stood fast and pushed through. I would have been even happier if BJP had offered support to the reforms.

A minimum of 46% of the rural population and 28% urban population will get 7 kg of foodgrains per month per person. Rice would be provided at Rs 3 a kg, wheat at Rs 2 and coarse grains at Rs 1 a kg.

The rest of the targeted population would get 3 kg of grains per person per month at half the minimum support price offered to farmers by government during procurement. Existing nutrition and select social security schemes would also be brought under the legislation as an entitlement.Food Security Bill cleared by Cabinet - Times Of India

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What about the Food Security Bill?

Where will the money come from?

What will be the indices to decide who are the various beneficiaries?

What Montek mandated about BPL rural and BPL Urban?

Well, who will find who actually are below those ridiculous sums of non wealth as per Montek?

Totally daft and not thought through and merely a populist slogan open to rampant corruption and mismanagement

I am getting more and more convinced that the real problem is this Gandhi family. They think of India as their fiefdom, and will do anything to keep it that way. That is the root for all these populist schemes that keep flowing from the top of the Congress, so as to retain the rural poor votebank.

And with this situation, people like Mamata still throw tantrums and withdraw support. Such people are the bane of India, they belong to India of the 1970s. People like her should be weeded out. I am very happy that the sensible people like MMS and Chidu stood fast and pushed through. I would have been even happier if BJP had offered support to the reforms.

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Sure, why not?

But why India need these reforms all of sudden?

What gone wrong after NDA (BJP) hand over the government to UPA (Congress) ?

Who is responsible for these men made mess?

When BJP was there in government, it was fine. Even at that time when congress came in as ruling party, India was much better.

Congress is ready to kick them out from the party for ever? I mean the roots of these men made mess, kick it out for ever.

Other wise after few years someone will do it again and we will end-up at the same place like just now what you said....... ' I would have been even happier if BJP had offered support to the reforms'.

Each time I read stuff like this, the thought comes, who is responsible for the utter mess created in the first place. UPA has no right to act all saint when it has been 8 years of inaction, when the only thing required of them was policy making and no more, even that was avoided till the brink. We can only thank our stars that there is a decent private sector in this country and not all is left to the government to run the affairs around.

That said, it is a welcome change of late and the other good, they havenâ€™t left it for too late, else whenever the next government was to be formed, the middle class of the country would have seen much more tough time than it is and will see in the coming few days.

I definitely want to see the diesel price revised by another Rs. 5 upwards prior to the fiscal end, and one can hope the rupee starts to trade between 49-50 a dollar by then, a lot of mismatch on the fiscal end will smoothen out. Kerosene price wonâ€™t be touched, else the UPA will fall.

The report warned that if mid-year corrective actions were not taken, the fiscal deficit would balloon to around 6.1 per cent of the gross domestic product (GDP), far higher than the budget estimate of 5.1 per cent.

The report projected that fiscal deficit for fiscal 2013-14 could fall to 4.6 per cent and come down to 3.9 per cent in 2014-15, if the measures to cut subsidies are undertaken.

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Fiscal deficit restrained to 3.9 in an election year is an impossible. If they are able to keep it below 5% to 5.5%, I would say they would have done a decent job. As I said the other day, it is in the interest of the country that the UPA government falls after the budget is passed, sometime after May next, and the elections get called in.

I am getting more and more convinced that the real problem is this Gandhi family. They think of India as their fiefdom, and will do anything to keep it that way. That is the root for all these populist schemes that keep flowing from the top of the Congress, so as to retain the rural poor votebank.

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I tend to agree with you somewhat.

They see a land of 1.2billion where there are millions of poor people, and they want to do something for them ergo they roll out populist scheme one after the other at the same time they think it makes for good vote winning politics. However, they do not realise that middle class is the trump card, and growth gives a trickle down effect. They need to eschew the politics of 70s and embrace the future.